Chapter 12
Marshall
“Now that I’m awake,” Emma said after she ate the last of the lemon pastry I’d given her for breakfast. “We really need to talk.”
Unfortunately, the only thing I could give her was coffee and that pastry for breakfast because it was the only thing we had on board the aircraft.
I’d feed her something more nutritious later.
She looked a little more rested after getting some decent sleep.
She also looked so beautiful that it was almost painful as she sat on the bed with her mug of coffee and her legs crossed in front of her.
Her hair was slightly tousled. Unfortunately, that made her look even sexier.
The short nightgown she was wearing didn’t cover a lot of her fair skin. I wasn’t sure whether I was grateful for that or if I hated it.
Hell, I liked looking at Emma this way, but my dick liked it, too, and it wasn’t easy to hide my erection since I hadn’t bothered to put on my jeans when I’d gone to get her coffee and that pastry.
I’d pulled the bed coverings to my waist when I’d seated myself next to her to drink my coffee.
She’d frowned at me a little, probably because she thought I was trying to cover my scarred leg.
Actually, I wasn’t.
She’d seen my leg and she hadn’t run away in horror. In fact, she hadn’t even flinched when she’d surveyed that injury.
In reality, I was trying to keep the hard-on I’d been sporting since I’d woken up with her voluptuous body sprawled across me hidden from view.
Christ! I wasn’t a damn teenager that couldn’t control my dick, but I suddenly felt like one because I was in the same room with Emma.
I was in my fifties now for fuck’s sake.
I was disgusted with my body’s reaction to this woman.
Yeah, she’d shown no aversion to my messed-up leg, but that didn’t mean the physical attraction was mutual.
Emma needed me to support her and comfort her right now after her kidnapping, and that was exactly what I was going to do.
Somehow, I was going to have to learn to keep my cock from bouncing to attention every damn time I saw her.
I’d seen plenty of beautiful women in the last fourteen years, and that had never happened.
I finally answered Emma, “So, talk. I want you to talk to me, Emma. That’s why I’m here as your advisor.”
We had about two hours before we’d be landing in Traverse City. We had plenty of time to drink our coffee and talk about whatever was bothering her.
She shook her head slowly as she met my gaze. “I don’t want to talk to my advisor and I don’t want to talk about the kidnapping. I want to talk to you, Colin.”
I shrugged. “Talk about whatever you want.”
My gut clenched as I saw the look of trepidation on her face before she said, “I’m just trying to figure out how to say this.”
She looked nervous, and I hated it. “Just tell me whatever you have to say. I’m not here to judge you.”
“I have a daughter, Colin. Her name is Wren,” she blurted out. “She’s a huge part of my life that I want to talk about.”
Okay, that was a little surprising, but it really wasn’t a big deal that she had a child. I hadn’t been with another woman for obvious reasons, but Emma hadn’t had a reason not to be with other men.
I knew she wasn’t with anyone now, but… “Were you married to her father?”
She shook her head. “No.”
Fuck! I was going to have to pry information out of her to get her to start talking about her kid, and that was unusual for Emma.
“How old is she?” I asked.
“She’s thirteen,” Emma answered hesitantly. “Colin, she’s not just my daughter. She’s your daughter, too. Wren was conceived during our fling in Virginia Beach. It never should have happened, but it did. I’m sorry. I had no way to contact you to let you know.”
I was so fucking stunned that I couldn’t utter a single word.
My mind automatically rejected the thought of having a kid.
It wasn’t possible, right?
Emma and I had been careful.
We’d had one broken condom incident, but Emma had told me she was safe from pregnancy concerns.
I finally pulled my head out of my ass enough to see that tears were streaming from Emma’s beautiful blue eyes.
“I don’t want or expect anything from you,” she said tearfully. “Wren and I have been fine with just the two of us. I just thought you had a right to know now that I’ve been able to see you again.”
Holy Fuck!
It was true.
“How?” I rasped. “I know we had the broken condom incident, but you told me that you couldn’t get pregnant.”
“I know,” she said regretfully. “I shouldn’t have gotten pregnant.
I was supposedly infertile because of my PCOS, Colin.
That’s the reason my ex dumped me for another woman with a healthier reproductive system.
We tried for years. The only other possible option was artificial insemination for me.
My ex-husband didn’t want to go that route because it was expensive and there was no guarantee it would result in a child.
He decided to just find a woman who could give him the kids he wanted.
I wasn’t on birth control yet when we met, but I had no reason to think I needed it for protection.
Wren was my miracle baby. My gynecologist was surprised, but she said it wasn’t totally impossible for me to conceive naturally, but it was extremely unlikely. ”
It took me a moment to let that information sink into my brain.
It wasn’t like I blamed her for getting pregnant.
Emma had good reason to believe she was infertile back then.
My mind was still trying to accept the fact that I had a daughter I hadn’t known about for thirteen fucking years.
“Were you upset when you found out?” I finally asked huskily.
“Not upset,” she denied. “I was shocked. I knew my entire life was going to change, but I wanted Wren from the moment I found out that I was pregnant. I’d already resigned myself to the fact that I’d probably never have the child I wanted.
I consoled myself with the thought that I might be able to adopt someday as a single parent.
After I found out, my mother urged me to come home to Cherry Cove so she could be there to support me and help me when I needed it.
I relocated back to Michigan before Wren was born and started my own business. ”
That information sobered me, and I wanted to kick myself for not giving a thought to how difficult this pregnancy must have been for Emma.
She’d been a single parent trying to start up her own business.
She’d been there for our daughter when I hadn’t been.
“I should have left you my damn contact information,” I said, my voice raw.
“No regrets,” Emma said emphatically. “I would have told you if I’d had your contact information, but I didn’t.
I don’t regret it, Colin. Wren has been the joy in my life since the moment she was born.
We can’t go back and change anything that happened, but please know I’ll never regret having our daughter.
I wanted you to know the truth, but I don’t expect anything from you.
Wren is going into high school. She survived her childhood just fine without two parents. ”
I quickly calculated my daughter’s exact age.
It hadn’t been quite fourteen years since Emma and I had been together.
I frowned. “She has to be barely thirteen.”
Emma nodded. “We just celebrated her birthday last month. She’s been a mini adult since grade school.
She has a genius IQ that she definitely didn’t inherit from me, but I wouldn’t let her skip a grade until she told me she was bored in school.
I finally agreed to let her skip her last year of grade school after she begged me to do it.
I wish I could show you her picture, but I don’t have my phone. ”
I swallowed the lump in my throat and requested, “Tell me what she looks like.”
Emma shrugged. “She looks like you. She has your brown hair and gray eyes. To me, she’s the cutest kid on the planet.”
Fucking hell!
I still couldn’t quite wrap my head around the fact that I had a child in the world that I didn’t know, but I was slowly accepting it.
“Who is she staying with while you’re gone?”
“She’s in San Diego with my mother. That’s the only reason I agreed to go to Lania,” Emma shared. “She’s been spending time with my mom in San Diego in the summer for the last few years. The two of them are really close.”
“What does Wren know about me?” I asked.
“As much as I know,” Emma told me. “She’s always known that I didn’t know where you were and it wasn’t your fault that you didn’t know about her.
I told her the whole story about Virginia Beach just recently because she finally asked those questions.
I saw no reason not to tell her that we had a fling and that we didn’t share any information.
I’ve always tried to be honest with Wren.
She’s not going to expect anything from you, either, Colin.
She knows that you never knew about her. ”
Everything that I’d missed in Wren’s life suddenly hit me.
I hadn’t been there for Emma, and I hadn’t been there for my daughter all of these years.
“Fuck that!” I said angrily. “She should expect things from me. You should expect things from me. I’m her goddamn father.”
“You’ve known you’re a father for a matter of minutes,” Emma argued. “What I’m saying is that you don’t have to jump in as a father if you don’t want to, and we’ve managed okay financially. I’m not suddenly going to start asking for child support or something.”
“I’m going to have to insist that you let me help,” I answered tersely. “You’ve borne the expense of our daughter alone for all these years. That’s bullshit.”
“She hasn’t suffered because she didn’t have a father, Colin,” Emma said softly.
Yeah, that was probably because Emma had sacrificed everything to give our kid everything she needed.
That was going to end right fucking now.
“I’m not wealthy like my billionaire partners,” I informed Emma. “But I’m extremely well-off. I’m more than capable of handling our daughter’s expenses and her college expenses in the future.”
Emma looked confused. “How is that possible? You’re a retired veteran, and Last Hope is a volunteer organization.”
Hell, I knew I was going to have to share something with her that I hadn’t shared with another soul.
“I’m not retired,” I explained. “And I’ve been investing since the day I got my first paycheck from the military.
Those investments have paid off extremely well.
I also work for the US government. I’m a contractor on top secret operations.
You’re the only person I’ve ever told about my job, and I’d prefer to keep it that way.
Most of my work is done by computer, but I get paid well for it. ”
“Are you a government hacker?” she guessed.
I shrugged. “Maybe. Let’s just say I gather intel and I’m exceptionally good at it.”
Emma held up a hand. “Okay, I get it. You can’t really talk about it, and I’m okay with that. I’m assuming it’s highly sensitive information.”
“Very sensitive,” I confirmed. “Lives depend on me keeping it to myself.”
She tilted her head. “Yet you just told me about it.”
“We have a child, Emma,” I said irritably. “You need to know that I’m not on a budget and unable to provide for Wren now and in the future.”
“She’s going to want you in her life, Colin,” Emma shared. “But she’ll understand if that isn’t something you’re prepared to do. I don’t even know if you’ve ever wanted a child.”
An hour ago, I would have said it wasn’t something I wanted.
Now that I knew I had a kid in the world, I wasn’t sure exactly what I wanted.
Hell yes, now that I knew Wren existed, I wanted to be in her life somehow.
“I’m not just going to walk away,” I admitted. “I have no idea how to be a father, Emma. I’m sure I’ll suck at it. I’ve never even interacted much with kids. It wasn’t something I ever wanted before, but I sure as fuck can’t pretend that Wren doesn’t exist.”
I wanted to be there for my child. I just wasn’t sure how to do that.
“She’s not a typical kid,” Emma said in a warning voice.
“She’s kind of like a small, very intelligent adult in a teenage body.
Her brain functions like an adult, but she still has teenage hormones and emotions.
Just get to know her, Colin. She’s not going to expect you to instantly be her father.
Honestly, she’s a lot like you. We’ll tell her together when she gets back from San Diego.
I’d like to give her some time with her grandmother first if that’s okay.
Wren has another two weeks there before she comes back to spend the rest of the summer with me.
She looks forward to her time with my mom in San Diego every year. ”
“That works,” I agreed. “I think you need some time to recover from the kidnapping, and I don’t expect her to change her life just because her father finally decided to show up.”
Hell, now that I knew that Wren existed, I wanted to meet her today. But my needs were secondary to what was best for Emma and Wren.
“I’ll fill you in on Wren’s past before you meet her,” Emma promised. “Just tell me what you want to know.”
“Start from the moment you knew you were pregnant and fill me in on what happened for the next fourteen years,” I requested.
Emma threw her head back and laughed.
Fuck! It was the first time I’d heard her laugh like that in years, and it made my gut twist painfully.
I’d loved her laugh so much that I’d done everything possible to hear it years ago.
“That’s going to take more time than we have on this flight,” she said once she’d recovered.
“We have time in Cherry Cove,” I said with a shrug.
I’d make time to hear about everything I’d missed over the last fourteen years.
For the first time in my life, Last Hope and my work wasn’t my priority. I knew in my gut that my regimented life was about to be turned upside down, and I wasn’t quite sure how I felt about that.